A royal protection policeman threatened to kill his best friend for exposing
his £3 million investment scam and warned out-of-pocket colleagues at
Buckingham Palace to stay silent, a court heard.

Paul Page, 38, was allegedly involved with a property company to illegally obtain loans and defraud investorsPhoto: PA

By Jon Swaine

1:39PM BST 17 Apr 2009

Paul Page, and his wife Laura, angrily confronted Fahim Baree at Mr Baree’s mother’s house in Leytonstone on March 30, 2007, it is alleged.

The previous day Mr Baree, a West End travel agent, had disclosed to police that he and 20 associates had lost more than £1.26 million in a bogus property company created by Mr Page, Southwark Crown Court was told.

“Mr Page, who smelt strongly of alcohol ... pushed Mr Baree up against the wall of the house, and said ‘I know what you did. Basically you’re dead’,” Mr Douglas Day QC, prosecuting, said.

After Mr Baree was ushered inside by his brother Farid, Mr Page told Farid that his brother was “dead” and “finished”, Mr Day said.

The threat was repeated by Mrs Page, 42, during an expletive-laden tirade delivered from the window of the couple’s car as they drove away, the court heard.

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Mr Page, 38, is alleged to have used the company, ULPD - which owned no property and filed no accounts - as a front to fund a huge gambling operation that started as a “Currency Club” between colleagues in the Palace, where he worked from 1998 to 2004.

Rather than put investors’ money into property, he used it to make disastrous bets and pay for the couple’s lavish lifestyle of sports cars and expensive clothes, the court heard. The money was laundered through Mrs Page’s bank accounts, it is alleged.

The court heard that Mr Page and Mr Baree had grown up together. “They went to the same nursery school, and remained close friends as adults,” Mr Day said.

“Mr Baree was best man at the defendants’ wedding. Mr Page called Mr Baree’s mother ‘auntie’.”

Yet Mr Page told Mr Baree a “pack of lies” and duped him with “mumbo jumbo” about the technicalities of spread betting to secure money, even persuading him to re-mortgage his and his parents’ houses, the court heard.

In addition to the £1.26 million from Mr Baree’s associates and £1.3 million he took from 20 police contacts, including several at Buckingham Palace, Mr Page also had a third “hub” of investors in Bristol contributing £387,000, the court heard.

He promised new investors interest rates of up to 2,600 per cent as he became increasingly desperate to pay off old creditors, the court heard.

He fended off those who demanded money back with excuses ranging from the death of relatives, the burglary of his office and that he had an infection caused by a spider in his eye, it is alleged.

“Mr Page was always ready, either with excuses for non-payment, or assurances about the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow,” Mr Day said.

On one occasion he took a sceptical investor to a cash point, and through an elaborate trick made it print a receipt showing that he was £878,000 in credit. This was a “blatant lie”.

As things worsened, “unpaid creditors chasing their money were subjected to aggressive and abusive language” by the couple, he added.

Finally the money ran out completely, forcing Mr Page even to borrow £40 to have a clamp removed from his car.

Once a “critical mass of unpaid creditors” mounted in July 2006, the police’s Directorate of Professional Standards launched an investigation, the court heard.

Mr Page “tried to persuade unpaid creditors to say nothing,” Mr Day said, telling them that “if the unpaid creditors remained silent, the investigation would stall and be discontinued,” he added.

Mr Page claims that all his investors knew they were part of a spread betting syndicate, the court heard. When arrested in April 2007, he told police: “I wish to express my regrets regarding the losses that have been suffered by investors, but to stress that they were fully aware of the risks.” Mrs Page refused to comment.

The couple, of Chafford Hundred, Essex, who have five children, deny eight charges between them relating to fraud, criminal dealings, intimidation, threatening to take revenge and a threat to kill.